I think you are misconstruing the info.
IIRC, the pumps didn't work, but that was due to HAVING JUST BEEN RAMMED BY A SUPERTANKER.
So, you would be correct not to believe they pumps didn't work before leaving dock.
However, they were in dock for repairs. They were given orders to leave before repairs were done. Parts of the radar/comm gear didn't work. They had to scavenge parts from one system to keep another working. They were short on crew. The crew was inexperienced. The crew was massively overworked.
That is the 'condition' of the ship that the ComSeventhFleet ordered out to sea.
Right there with you on that. There is no excuse for that and the articles title is right on.... a warship doomed its own Navy. Due to my own biases I split the article into that crap that leadership set in place and the actions of the crew after it happened.
I was reading a book about a sailor on a ship that was hit by a kamikaze and he lamented that “When the bomb hits, everything stops working, especially the stuff you practiced with”. It really came down to “How much chaos can we control?”.
He goes to his gun mount and the gun mount is gone. While he is staring at it and wondering what to do, someone comes by and gives him a job.